A blog about my journey into the realms of DIY and guitar effects building

February 6, 2012

Building A Klon Buffer

I kept reading the Klon's buffer is the best buffer ever and "makes everything sound better", etc. Curious as I am, i wanted to try this myself. I didn't need to source any parts except a 1590A sized enclosure and some jacks that I bought at a local electronics store. I decided to paint this one too and went with blue metallic. The layout I used came from FSB once again and was made by mcaviel.

My build looks like this:

I can't really say how the buffer "sounds", because it's barely coloring my tone. The most noticable difference is a very very slight volume drop because i used two 1k resistors in parallel instead of a 560k for R5. This won't make much of a difference though because a buffer is not something you switch on and off all the time, hence no footswitch. I probably don't have a large enough effects chain yet for it to make a difference in my signal.

Nonetheless, this is a highly recommend project for beginners because it's so simple. No need to drill for a foot switch and pots, four little holes and you're set. And they don't even have to be aligned. No battery clip nor LED.